Do you think the Federal and state governments have major ethics culture problems? Municipal governments say “Hold my beer!”
1. The city with the deadest ethics alarms in the U.S.? It might be Quincy, Florida…
Quincy hired Robert Nixon as its city manager. Now Quincy Commissioner Beverly Nash has called on the city commission to terminate Nixon, alleging the city violated its own guidelines and possibly state law by hiring him. Why, you well may ask?
Nixon had pleaded guilty to charges of embezzling government funds and served 21 months in prison. The 2010 criminal case was brought after Nixon and an accomplice schemed to pocket $134,000 in federal Housing and Urban Development grant money meant for Tallahassee-area small businesses. Nixon was the director of Florida A&M University’s urban policy institute when he stole from a grant fund-holding account at Florida A&M Federal Credit Union, where his co-defendant was president. The two tried to disguise withdrawals as consulting and administrative fees. They got caught red-handed.
Quincy has a population of about 8,000 and is located at the center of Gadsden County. “Technically we have gone astray and violated our own policies and procedures,” Nash said during a city commission meeting. “When adherence to policy slowly erodes, what is left? Wrong becomes right. The lines and boundaries are missing and blurred.”
The controversy is bogged down in a technical debate over whether or not it is illegal for Quincy to hire a convicted felon who has not had his right to hold official office restored. You can read the details of that irrelevancy here. It doesn’t matter whether Quincy can hire someone who had embezzled government fund as its city manager. Whether the city can or not, it is incompetent, irresponsible and stupid to do so. This is signature significance on metaphorical steroids. Nixon, predictably, is full of talk about redemption and second chances. “I had a debt to society and I paid it. I think it’s important that there is a pathway forward for people with felonies who want a second chance,” Nixon says. Sure there is a pathway: that path begins somewhere the felon does not have opportunities to steal his employer’s money.
The reality is this: nobody who is trustworthy embezzles government funds once or ever. Maybe a city could justify hiring a contrite former embezzler as its city manager after every candidate in the country who has not embezzled cash perishes from some China-planted ethics plague. Absent that unlikely scenario, the hiring is indefensible.
Here’s my favorite part of this astounding story: The Quincy city attorney was one of Nixon’s defense lawyers in the embezzlement case.
2. Oh no, flags again…
In January, the new West Boylston (Massachusestts) Town Administrator James Ryan was taken on a tour of the West Boylston police station by Police Chief Dennis Minnich. Ryan saw a “Trump ’24” banner hanging on the station’s gym wall and subsequently demanded that flag be taken down.
Minnich removed the banner while noting there are “no town rules regarding flags in public buildings.” However, when Ryan sent an “unauthorized town employee” to ensure that the banner had been taken down, Chief Minnich filed a complaint.
Based on that complaint, the town board terminated Ryan without a hearing. Ryan’s attorney’s statement is here. Ethics 101: No political, religious or other non-official flags, posters, personal statements or promotional material for non-governmental events, products or services should ever be displayed in a government facility. Ryan was correct, and he was also correct to send an employee to check on whether the flag had been removed. But the police chief had more influence, so Ryan was fired anyway.
Bonus: This story involves police ethics, though on the state rather than local level. I might as well add it here because it made me do a Danny Thomas spit-take this morning.
Massachusetts State Police Detective Capt. Thomas McCarthy, earned $349,815 in overtime pay in 2024, making his total salary $584,072 according to state Comptroller records. Today the Boston Herald reported on his justifications for the astounding amount. They included working while taking a sick day, and Christmas caroling.
Every state, city and town needs its own equivalent of DOGE.
Ethics Alarms 
Our town had a fraudster who ran an insurance company that took payments, but didn’t put the money toward the clients’ premiums. He was eventually convicted of fraud and banned from having a business license. He then ran businesses under a relative’s name. He was eventually elected to city council and kept inserting programs to ‘promote things’ in a variety of bills. For instance, the bond issue to bring the city sidewalks up to code was $1 million for the sidewalks and $3 million to ‘promote new business in the city’. Most of the voters who voted for him were unaware of his fraud conviction, but the other people on the city council, the prominent people who promoted him, and the media that endorsed him knew.
Any program who purpose is to ‘promote’ or ‘raise awareness’ raises my suspicion of fraud. It is shocking how many people in government seem to be in it only for the outright fraud aspect.
No … other flags … . Really? No American flags, no state flags, no city flags?
No … posters … . So, the USPS has to remove those posters listing items that cannot be mailed?
No … statements … . Not sure when a poster becomes a statement, but the FLSA requires certain provisions of the law, essentially a statement of the rights of an employee, be posted in buildings so that employees can see the statement.
Wow. Staying ethically pure ain’t easy.
I think that is being obtuse. A poster for labor laws and AG labor tipline, as every business is required by state law will not be seen as an endorsement or political statement. A US flag or state flag won’t be an issue either. Now a bit FJB/Let’s go Brandon flag, or poster of Kamala brat summer, or some such, not kosher.
Of course. How stupid of me to take what people write at face value rather than altering the meaning to what I would have wanted them to say. Thus, when you say I was being obtuse, you actually meant I was being brilliant. My sincere thanks (and take that to mean whatever you wish it to mean).
Having fun playing “Gotcha!” are we? Of course, you knew exactly what I meant by “No political, religious or other flags, posters, statements or promotional material should ever be displayed in a government facility,” because we both know you’re a smart guy. I admit it was stated a bit sloppily, and I should have specified that I was referring to non-official, personal “statements or promotions,” including promotions of products or events unrelated to the police department, and I will fix that drafting error as soon as I sign off on this comment. You also know that your point, valid though it is, was tangential to the ethics issue in the post, which was a political flag, and that the city manager was fired for correctly enforcing what is standard procedure in virtually any government office, and if it isn’t, it should be. But still, you’re right, HJ.I could have and should have been clearer.
My wife thinks I’m a mind reader, too. I tend to favor precision, in comments and in grocery lists. Fewer mistakes that way.
If they had a DOGE for the great Commonwealth of Massachusetts, they would probably have to shutter a third of the departments. If it’s not the State Police having some kind of overtime scandal, then it will be the MBTA (the local Boston area public transit agency, kind of like MTA in NYC). And then the homeless shelter provisions, which now are like 90% housing “migrants” in undisclosed motels around the state, oh boy.
The good news is it appears the City of Quincy’s council is extremely diverse!